Handing out Midseason Awards for the NFL's Best of the Best

The NFL is sort of at the halfway point, and that means we (I) need to handout some meaningless hardware. But first, a quick tangent:

Is there any other postseason award that is weirder than the NFL's? First off, the NFL is not in charge of handing out the primary awards. The Associated Press is responsible for the whole pageant, so that means we do not really know who is voting for who, or who is even voting at all. Maybe a few people will come out and say, "Hey, I'm involved", but otherwise, we don't know.

There are no glorious moments like finding out someone voted B.J. Surhoff for the Hall of Fame. The fun is missing, and there is no one to make fun of. I'm not really complaining; all this does is show that these awards are probably meaningless due to the NFL not having a centralized award government despite the fact that the NFL is involved in literally everything else.

Defensive Rookie of the Year

I have a rough time judging defensive players, mainly because I have a poor attention span and am easily amazed by shiny objects like Troy Polamalu or Ed Reed.

Von Miller, the linebacker for the Broncos, is the top ranking defensive rookie on friend of B/R Matt Williamson's power rankings, so I'll choose him.

He really has been "steady and consistent while also making plenty of big plays, despite lining up as a strongside linebacker -- which generally doesn't lend itself to showing up as much as Miller has."

Offensive Rookie of the Year

Al Messerschmidt/Getty Images

This is easy. This year's hype is Cam Newton, a man who made football interesting in Carolina and football intereseting to Steve Smith. Both of those accomplishments are equally impressive, as are Newton's gaudy numbers:

GP

CMP

ATT

CMP%

YDS

AVG

TD

INT

8

174

287

60.6

2,393

8.34

11

9

That, an 87.1 QBR and seven rushing touchdowns make Newton the obvious choice, a hero in the geographical region where he used to steal computers.

Offensive Player of the Year

Tom Szczerbowski/Getty Images

This award infuriates me, because sometimes the Offensive Player of the Year differs from the MVP, and we know MVP's are only allowed to be offensive players, specifically quarterbacks and running backs (right?).

How is this possible? How can you go on and on about how phenomenal Rodgers' season has been and how it's a season for the ages, and then say screw it, Jackson is the best offensive player in football, when this obviously isn't true. Gah.

MVP

Harry How/Getty Images

Fred Jackson! No, it's Aaron Rodgers for reasons that should not need explained. He is playing out of his gourd and endangers self-esteems of other quarterbacks after every bullet released from his arm cannon.

Coach of the Year

Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images

Jim Harbaugh, resident superhero for the San Francisco 49ers. What he's done is nothing short of amazing, and he is a big reason why the city of San Francisco hasn't revolted against the idiocy of Jed York.

He made the team watchable and relevant, and isn't that really every coach's job? To insert excitement? It's not? Whatever.